


Interests in Common

by myrmidryad



Series: Underground Dreaming [1]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-10
Updated: 2018-03-10
Packaged: 2019-03-29 13:02:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13927665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myrmidryad/pseuds/myrmidryad
Summary: Three students of the Sorbonne's Practical Applications of Magic course meet and discuss their craft.





	Interests in Common

**Author's Note:**

> Vaticinator: a licensed practitioner who uses methods of divination such as scrying or tarot cards to look into the future.  
> Diabolist: a licensed practitioner specialising in connections with entities beyond human comprehension, including angels, demons, ghosts, and other spirits. Usually specialises further in ghostly activity. Not always given much credence by the public or other practitioners.
> 
> Title from [We Could Be Friends](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g09WSFuSnF0) by the Freelance Whales.

Enjolras didn’t speak as he walked out of the lecture hall, and at his side neither did Courfeyrac, which was a much more notable occurrence. The other students were chattering loudly around them, the crowd carrying them out of the building and into the September sunshine.

“Fuck,” Courfeyrac said finally, and Enjolras nodded. “I mean…fuck.”

“Yeah.” Enjolras caught his eye and then glanced around at their fellow students with an expression of pointed confusion, which Courfeyrac caught and nodded at, eyes wide.

“Yeah!”

No one else seemed to care much about anything that had just been said. No one else seemed to care much about being here at all, period. As if they’d just attended a lecture in History or Economics – something that most of the universities in the country taught – and not a lecture on Practical Applications of Magic, one of the rarest available courses in the country. Only a handful of universities outside the elite grandes écoles taught magic-related subjects at all, and they were always highly competitive.

He and Courfeyrac walked to the bus stop in silence, and Enjolras let Courfeyrac have the window seat when they got on the next bus. They both held their tongues all the way back to the little two-bedroom apartment they shared in the third arrondissement, and Enjolras started to smile as they approached their building. He fancied he could feel the impatience coming off Courfeyrac in waves, which wasn’t impossible – he did have very mild empathetic abilities – but was still unlikely. His touch was for groups, not individuals.

Courfeyrac took the stairs two at a time, and made chivvying noises to hurry Enjolras up. The second the door of their apartment was closed behind them he slumped dramatically against the wall. “What the fuck?!”

The hallway was too narrow for them both to slump so Enjolras kept walking through to their living room.

“I mean seriously,” Courfeyrac called after him. “What the actual fuck?”

Enjolras sat down on the sofa and frowned, letting himself sink back against the cushions. “We don’t know anything.”

“Counterpoint,” Courfeyrac said, finally following him in and pointing a finger at him. “We know a different way of doing things.”

Enjolras seized the thought gratefully and nodded. “Maybe.”

“Because when you think about it, there were some pretty glaring holes in those points he was making,” Courfeyrac said, sitting down on the table to face Enjolras. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and matched Enjolras’ frown with one of his own. “I know people like putting things in boxes, but it doesn’t work if the boxes don’t make sense. Like, okay, splitting magic into cerebral and terrestrial is fair enough, everyone knows that, but all the other categories?”

“Nothing is purely cerebral,” Enjolras told the ceiling. He’d been going over everything the professor had said on their way home, and he kept sticking on that point. “When you think about it, everything has a terrestrial effect. Even a spell only meant to influence your own thoughts will have physical effect when it comes to how your thoughts influence your actions.”

“That’s a really roundabout way of saying that magic is magic and any attempt to categorise it will only make you look like a fool,” Courfeyrac said dryly. “It’s not just me, right? He sounded like an idiot trying to tell us that everything can fall under the cerebral and terrestrial umbrellas, with all sorts of sub-groups like charms and conjuration and enchantment. I mean, what’s the difference between charming and enchanting?”

Enjolras nodded absently “It’s like trying to divide magic into black and white.”

“Malignant and benign,” Courfeyrac corrected.

“Right. Because you could technically use something like blood magic in aid of a good cause.”

“I wouldn’t put that in an essay though. You’d get pulled up in front of the head of department at least.”

“It’s true though!” Enjolras sat up properly and met Courfeyrac’s eyes. “You’re right – it isn’t us, it’s them. They’ve got a small-minded approach.”

“Think of it this way.” Courfeyrac shrugged and got to his feet. “We can use the course to advance in a purely practical sense. We don’t have to internalise all their ideas – we’re completely at liberty to cherry pick. Coffee?”

“Yeah. Doesn’t it piss you off though?”

Courfeyrac hummed as he went into the kitchen and Enjolras followed him, annoyed that he had to so they could keep their voices down. Courfeyrac got two cups out and set the kettle boiling. “Not yet. I think it’s going to piss me off more the further in we get. It’s going to piss me off more when other students start spouting that bullshit and I won’t be able to say anything without looking really suspicious. I wonder if it’s like this at the grandes écoles?”

“I wonder if it’s like this in the secret societies and Orders connected to them,” Enjolras said darkly. “I bet it’s not.”

“Your mum warned us it’d be like this.”

“I’d kind of hoped it had changed since her day though.”

Courfeyrac snorted. “You know what she’d say to that.”

“Nothing changes.” Enjolras’ lips twitched. “Unless you make it. I don’t know how we’re supposed to change this though.”

“It might not be as bad as we think.” Courfeyrac turned and leaned against the counter. Their kitchen was narrow, with the oven, fridge, and sink on one side, and shelves and the washing machine on the other. Having to go through it to get to the bathroom (which didn’t even have a door) was probably the most annoying thing about their apartment, and Enjolras hadn’t quite gotten used to it yet. It was still a novelty, after a week, to be living with just Courfeyrac.

“Have you read the textbooks yet?” Enjolras raised an eyebrow, and Courfeyrac laughed.

“I’ve skimmed like, the first chapter. And don’t get all snooty, I know you haven’t read them yet either. But anyway – he was just one lecturer. They might not all be like that.”

“Ever the optimist.”

“Someone has to be.” Courfeyrac gave him a big, sunny grin and poked his hip to make him move out of the way of the fridge door. “I have to balance out your sulking.”

“I don’t sulk!” Enjolras nudged him back, and jumped out of the way before Courfeyrac could retaliate and turn it into a full-on wrestling match, which their tiny kitchen definitely wouldn’t be able to handle.

His mother had taken PracAp at university when she was a student, for pretty much exactly the same reasons Enjolras and Courfeyrac were taking it now – with so much magical instruction behind a wall, it was the safest way to learn more. Celine had never used her qualification in a professional setting, but she was a regular practitioner, and she’d taught Enjolras (and through him, Courfeyrac) far more than the average French teenager knew. The second thing they had done in their new apartment after unpacking was cleanse and ward it. After their first lecture, both boys doubted that their classmates would have done anything like that.

Most of the other PracAp students would be approaching this subject from scratch. They probably had no experience in spellwork more serious than playground games and amateurish love spells bought from state-sponsored stores.

Celine’s ridicule for the ready-made spell kits and basic ingredients people could buy from their local magic shop was well-known to her son and his best friend. She’d taught Enjolras how to sense magic from a young age, and he’d taught Courfeyrac. How many of the other PracAp students would have actually tested the ingredients from a state-sponsored magic shop against ones gathered by the caster?

The answer, it turned out, was complicated.

Enjolras and Courfeyrac only shared a couple of classes, since Courfeyrac was specialising in the anthropological side of magic use and Enjolras was more interested in the theory behind those uses. They reported on the content of their separate classes to each other meticulously, comparing notes and the reactions of their classmates.

Enjolras’ classes (which were, as he’d guessed, assuming a much lower level of knowledge and competence than he himself possessed) had approached the monopoly the sponsored shops held on magical supplies. Their teacher had agreed that in many cases, the practitioner could achieve the same result, if not a better one, with ingredients they had gathered themself.

“But,” Enjolras told Courfeyrac, “of course you’re not technically not meant to charge your own materials for magical use. It’s a grey area with the law, like my mum says, but we won’t be taught how to do it until the end of the year! And even then it’s with the understanding that we won’t be using it to actually cast spells – it’s just to prove we know the theory well enough to actually do it.”

“Good thing we already know how to do that then,” Courfeyrac sighed. “Shame about everyone else though.”

Courfeyrac’s classes were no better at challenging the status quo. He and Enjolras had both been hoping that his module on other magical cultures would include actual input from those cultures, but it turned out to be a very external view, filtered through the French High Ceremonial lens.

“As if any of us are going to be dressing up in robes and summoning angels!” Courfeyrac said with disgust after a particularly dull lecture. “It’s completely irrelevant! It’s been irrelevant since the fucking sixties! No one does that anymore!”

“They might at higher levels,” Enjolras pointed out. “It’s always been implied that it’s more effective if you have all the ceremony.”

“Implied, but never proved.”

It was all so frustrating, and Enjolras’ hunts online for other students who felt the same way was turning up very little. He didn’t want to say anything to any of his classmates in case they didn’t feel the same way, and none of them seemed to based on his observations of them.

Courfeyrac wasn’t so unlucky.

Enjolras was still in bed when Courfeyrac texted him to say he was bringing a girl over for lunch, because he’d stayed up till half three in the morning by accident. So he wasn’t thinking entirely clearly when he rolled out of bed and headed for the shower, and he didn’t bring any clothes with him. Of course, Courfeyrac had only texted about five minutes before arriving, so Enjolras was still in the shower when he heard the door open.

“Enjolras?”

“You fucker,” Enjolras whispered furiously, and steeled himself before raising his voice. “In the shower!” His mood was not improved by hearing Courfeyrac laugh, and it turned even darker when Courfeyrac came into the kitchen.

“I’m just making coffee, don’t mind me,” he said cheerfully.

“You’re a bastard,” Enjolras called through the shower cubicle door.

“I can wait in the living room,” another voice said – presumably the girl Courfeyrac had brought back with him.

“You don’t have to do that,” Courfeyrac told her, at the same time as Enjolras called, “Yes please!”

“Enjolras!” Courfeyrac scolded. Through the frosted glass of the cubicle, Enjolras saw him appear in the bathroom doorway. “That’s no way to treat a guest.”

“Yeah, well this is no way to treat your roommate,” Enjolras snapped. “Get out! I’m not done. And make me a coffee too,” he added.

“Oh, your wish is my command.” Courfeyrac gave a mocking bow and backed out. Enjolras finished rinsing his hair and for a moment contemplated the possibility of just staying the shower, where it was nice and warm. He dismissed it immediately and turned off the water, wincing in anticipation of the cold when he opened the cubicle door and snatched his towel off the hook on the wall next to it. Partly to preserve his privacy (a losing battle when it came to Courfeyrac, he was learning) and partly to try and hold onto the warmth, he dried himself as best he could while still inside the cubicle before stepping out.

“I hate you,” he told Courfeyrac as he tucked the towel around his waist. “Give me coffee.”

“Were you still in bed?” Courfeyrac asked in an undertone, leaning back so he could look through the doorway at Enjolras. His tone was the exact blend of amusement and disbelief to make Enjolras flush.

“I overslept by accident,” he muttered, wiping his feet on the bathmat to try and dry off his soles. If he didn’t, he’d end up with all sorts of dirt and bits of food stuck to them from walking through the kitchen.

“Some accident – it’s almost noon!”

“Shut up. I was up late.” Enjolras grimaced and started to walk, Courfeyrac pressing himself against the fridge so he could get past. His bedroom was opposite the kitchen, so as long as Courfeyrac’s friend wasn’t standing in eyesight of it –

Of course, that’s exactly where she was. She must have been looking out of the window, and at the sound of footsteps turned to look. Enjolras caught a glimpse of a short black girl in a blue coat for a fraction of a second before he reached his room and closed the door. He didn’t have a mirror in his bedroom, but he didn’t need one to know he was blushing from his hairline right down to his chest.

Courfeyrac was a terrible friend, and an even worse roommate.

By the time he’d dressed he wasn’t feeling so embarrassed (not enough to still be blushing, at least), and he came into the living room to find Courfeyrac and his friend sitting next to each other on the sofa.

“Coffee,” Courfeyrac said before anyone else could speak, and pointed to a blessedly steaming mug on the table. “And a cushion,” he added, tugging a cushion out from behind him and throwing it onto the floor on the other side of the coffee table. Enjolras sighed and went to sit on it, and Courfeyrac’s friend started protesting.

“Oh no – you should sit, I’ll take the floor, don’t worry.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Courfeyrac laughed, gesturing for her to stay where she was as she half rose to her feet, an expression of consternation on her face. “You’re the guest! Besides, Enjolras doesn’t mind, do you?”

“No.” Enjolras reached for his coffee as soon as he was seated and inhaled deeply before taking a sip. “Sorry,” he said, finally remembering his manners. “I don’t normally sleep in so late.”

“It’s fine.” She was very pretty when she smiled, though she still bit her lip a second later and asked, “Are you sure you don’t want to sit on the sofa?”

Enjolras had to smile. “I’m fine down here.”

“He likes it,” Courfeyrac assured her. “Oh – shit, sorry – Enjolras, this is Cosette! Cosette, this is my roommate Enjolras. Which you already know, because I told you all about him on the way.”

“Nice to meet you,” Enjolras said, only a bit awkwardly. He’d thought that Courfeyrac had been bringing a girl back for a date, but that probably wasn’t the case if Courfeyrac had told her all about him and had also just made Enjolras join them. Not that he knew much about dates, having been on a grand total of zero in his life. He could at least tell that Cosette was pretty though. She was wearing a brightly patterned headwrap, and metallic blue eyeliner that stood out on her dark skin. She’d taken her coat off too, and Enjolras wondered whether it would be weird to tell her that he liked her shirt – it said FEMINIST across the front in big white letters.

“Cosette’s in my Magic in Religion module,” Courfeyrac told him. “We were paired up today for a project thing and look, the important thing is that she actually practices and also thinks that we’re being taught mostly nonsense.”

“Oh my God.” Enjolras sat up and looked at her properly. “Thank God. I thought we were the only ones.”

“Right?” Courfeyrac beamed. “And get this – her dad practices too! Just like your mum!”

Cosette gave a stilted little wave, smiling shyly. “Hi.”

“What do you think about the way we haven’t been taught anything practical yet?” Enjolras asked her.

She raised her eyebrows, but shrugged. “I’m not surprised at all. Did you think we would be taught actual spellcraft?”

“I thought we’d be taught _something_.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think they actually teach us the practical side of the application until at least the second semester. Most people need the grounding in the theory first.”

“We already know it all though,” Courfeyrac sighed. “Or, y’know, a version of it anyway.”

“They want you to have the official version.” She shrugged again. “You can’t really blame them for that.”

“I can and will,” Courfeyrac said promptly. “Anyway, this is a good time, in my opinion, to bring up how weirdly repressed I’ve been feeling lately.”

Enjolras stared at him. “I’m not awake enough for this.”

“Magically!” Courfeyrac added, realising too late what that had sounded like. “Oh my God. Magically, I’ve been feeling magically repressed, kind of stagnant. Frozen, if you like. Enjolras, you haven’t done anything since we moved in either.”

“It’s only been a few weeks,” Enjolras protested.

“Okay, but we were doing shit all the time back home.” Courfeyrac glanced at Cosette. “Speaking just for myself, I thought coming here and doing this would be really inspiring and invigorating, but it’s just made me doubt everything I thought I knew.”

Enjolras frowned, looking down at his coffee.

“I think I know what you mean,” Cosette said, as he thought. She spoke slowly, like she wasn’t sure she was allowed to have an input. “I think it’s because we’re all assumed to be such beginners. I’ve actually been using it to go back and re-examine my own practice.”

“What do you mean?” Courfeyrac asked, scooching back against the arm of the sofa and pulling one leg up onto the cushions to better face Cosette.

“Well…” Cosette gave them both a hesitant look, and Enjolras shook his head.

“We’re all illegal practitioners when you get down to it, don’t worry about us reporting you for anything.”

Her lips twisted as she bit back a smile. “What’s the most illegal thing you’ve done?”

“In terms of severity?” Enjolras looked at Courfeyrac, trying to think. “Influencing other people, I suppose.”

“Not counting each other.” Courfeyrac grinned at him. “We haven’t done that much to directly influence others.”

Enjolras raised an eyebrow. “We’ve cursed people.” He watched Cosette from the corner of his eye for a reaction, but she just smiled.

“Everyone does that,” she said. “Or tries to anyway. Did you successfully curse people?”

“There was Chéron,” Courfeyrac said, looking at Enjolras.

“And maybe Naudin,” he agreed. “We gave one of our classmates a run of bad luck that definitely led to him breaking up with his girlfriend,” he explained to Cosette. “And getting a bad haircut, and apparently being called on in class whenever he didn’t know the answers. Naudin was one of our teachers, so we don’t know how much of an effect our curse had, but he looked more tired after we cast it. That doesn’t bother you?” he checked.

“I went to a Catholic school,” Cosette said, smiling ruefully. “An all-girls Catholic school. So all the curses were Bible-based, but there was still a lot of baneful magic going on. Or, like I said, girls would go through the motions of casting spells without actually doing anything.”

“Right.” Unless the practitioner had some ability to actually sense and manipulate magic, they could say all the right words and do all the right things for things from healing spells to necromantic rituals and still not have any actual effect. Enjolras cleared his throat. “What about you then?”

“I specialise in enchanting jewellery and makeup,” she said, and bit her lip before touching her neck, slipping her fingertips under a fine chain Enjolras hadn’t noticed and drawing out a little pendant – a heart with a silver letter C dangling inside it. “This is for detecting lies.”

“How does it work?” Courfeyrac and Enjolras asked at the same time, and they both smiled when Cosette laughed, reassured by their enthusiasm.

“It’s really basic, actually. I charge it up and speak an incantation and recharge it whenever it gets weak.”

“What’s the source?” Courfeyrac asked. “You?”

“Mmhm.” She smiled wider, and dimples appeared in her cheeks. “But this,” she lifted her left hand and wiggled her fingers, indicating the ring on her middle finger. “Is sun-charged to keep me cheerful. And this one,” she showed them a ring on her right index finger, “is for aiding memory, and this one,” – the ring on her right ring finger – “is for protection from malign magic.”

“How do you know when someone lies to you?” Enjolras asked, fascinated. “What’s the effect?”

“I just know.” She shrugged. “It’s entirely cerebral. I’m not very good at terrestrial magic. It’s the same with my rings. There’s a guy I know who says it’s because I’m used to thinking instead of acting,” she added, smiling. “He says I need more confidence. But enough about me – what do you two focus on? Or.” She looked at Enjolras. “Courfeyrac told me you’ve both used written spells a lot?”

“Yeah.” Enjolras exchanged a look with Courfeyrac. “I have a notebook on it, if you want to see.”

She lit up, then made a visible effort to tamp it down. “If you don’t mind.”

Enjolras pushed himself to his feet and shook his head, putting his half-empty coffee mug down on the table. “I think the secrecy around these things does more harm than good.”

“I’m not so good at keeping notes,” Courfeyrac told Cosette as Enjolras went to his bedroom. The apartment was small enough that he could still hear them as he found his notebook – he refused to call it a grimoire. “Enjolras is more meticulous. Most of the bigger things are things we’ve done together though, so he’s sort of taken notes for the both of us.”

“Sort of,” Enjolras said, coming back in and handing the book to Cosette. It wasn’t anything special – a standard A4 Clairefontaine pad with a battered blue cover. “There’s an index in the back, but it’s not like there’s much variation in my style, really. Most of what I’ve done I learned from my mother, and she favours sigils over pretty much anything else, so I’m good at those for quick spells, but I don’t find them very effective for anything long-term.”

“I have a friend who would love this,” Cosette murmured, flicking through. “I think I should introduce you. He’s really good at nailing down magical theory.”

“That’s the part I struggle with most,” Courfeyrac said. “And right now, that’s the part that’s making me freeze up.”

“I think I’m just bad at stepping out of my comfort zone,” Enjolras shrugged. Almost all of the spells in his book were either sigils or incantations, with a few larger rituals he and Courfeyrac had done together. They hadn’t been particularly adventurous either, he was realising now. All of their spells had been fairly standard – nothing that couldn’t be bought pre-packaged from a shop. They’d thought themselves so daring and transgressive, but really they hadn’t been doing anything special. And they still weren’t, even now. He had expected the university and his classes to do the work for him, in that respect, and now that they weren’t, Courfeyrac was right – both of them were floundering.

“Your style’s very different to mine,” Cosette said softly, looking through the index now. “Have either of you ever tried doing anything with herbs?”

“Hedgecraft?” Courfeyrac wrinkled his nose, and Cosette’s smile faded. He hurried to reassure her at once. “Neither of us thought we’d be any good at it, and you know what prepared herbs cost.”

“You can grow your own,” she pointed out, and he shrugged awkwardly.

“Neither of us have green fingers either.”

“To be fair,” Enjolras put in, “it’s not like we ever really tried. Do you use plants a lot?” he asked Cosette.

“I do a lot of magic in the kitchen,” she nodded. “I find it’s one of the easiest, quickest ways to cast spells.”

“By ingesting them?” Courfeyrac grinned, obviously trying to get Cosette back on his side.

“And crafting them as you cook.” She gave him a small smile, relaxing again. “I could show you, if you want. That’s another advantage – you can do it pretty much anywhere.”

“Definitely show us,” Courfeyrac enthused, jumping to his feet. “What do you need?”

“Only your kitchen.” She took his offered hand to help her to her feet, and followed Courfeyrac through to their narrow kitchen. Enjolras followed with his coffee, keeping outside so he wouldn’t get in the way.

Courfeyrac, on Cosette’s other side, grimaced at him as she looked through their fridge. _What?_ Enjolras mouthed. Courfeyrac rolled his eyes and looked around pointedly, and…well. Enjolras frowned, finally noticing how grimy the place was. Neither of them had cleaned since they’d moved in, and now he was looking at it properly, it was kind of disgusting. Courfeyrac’s mother would throw a fit if she could see.

“Hmm. I’ll just make tea, I think.” Cosette’s expression, when she stood up and closed the fridge, was carefully schooled. It was far more damning than Courfeyrac’s faces could ever be. “Do you have any?”

“Uhhh…yeah, Enjolras, Celine gave you tea before we left, right?”

“Somewhere.” Their kitchen had a really odd mishmash of storage. There were cupboards above the counter, and a little green bookshelf unit on the floor opposite the fridge. There were corner shelves above the washing machine, and a cabinet fixed to the wall, and an odd hanging basket type thing next to it with three baskets on a wire frame. Enjolras thought they were meant for vegetables, but he and Courfeyrac were using them for bread.

They found the tea on the corner shelves, hidden behind a tin of hot chocolate powder. “Mint,” Enjolras said, handing Cosette the box. “Is that okay?”

“It’s perfect, thank you.” She took it and removed one teabag. Behind her, Courfeyrac filled the kettle, and after replacing the box, Enjolras passed her a mug. “Thank you.” She smiled as she put the mug on the counter. “I usually spell the bag, or the leaves, if I’m using loose-leaf tea.”

“What with?” Courfeyrac asked curiously.

“Well, I’m about to show you.” She smiled at him, eyes bright, and then turned her attention to the teabag, holding it gently in the palm of her right hand. Either side of her, Enjolras and Courfeyrac leaned in to watch. “ _Wake up, buttercup_ ,” Cosette said softly, and Enjolras could feel the power behind her words, settling in the teabag she held. “ _Look alive, look alive. Rise up, rise up. Open eyes, open eyes_. The source is twofold. Threefold, technically,” she said, not looking away from the teabag. Enjolras could feel the magic that had settled in it, like an invisible glow. “I give it a bit of a nudge with my own power, I pull power from the sound of my voice, and that adds to the raw ingredients. Mint is a fairly good one for waking – it wouldn’t really work as well with chamomile, you know?”

The kettle boiled, and she dropped the teabag into the mug with no ceremony and poured hot water on top of it. Enjolras felt the magic give a little jolt, like it was expanding. “The heat of the water adds to it too,” Cosette said. “All the parts combine in a process. And then when you drink it, it acts like a magical caffeine boost, but without the caffeine.”

“Can we try?” Courfeyrac asked, already reaching out to the mug. Cosette opened her mouth, but Enjolras got there first, reaching over to smack his hand away.

“It’s literally just boiled, leave it for a minute first.”

“Oh yeah. Let’s take it through then. We look kinda weird all huddled round a mug.”

“Well it is technically a potion,” Enjolras pointed out, backing out of the kitchen so the other two could follow him.

Cosette carried the mug, smiling again. “I’ve always liked that.”

“What?” Courfeyrac asked. “Calling them potions?”

She nodded. “It makes them seem more impressive, when they’re really just tea.”

“Magical tea!” Despite being last into the room, Courfeyrac was first to flop back onto the sofa. Enjolras took the cushion on the floor again before Cosette could, leaving her to join Courfeyrac. “It’s cool! I haven’t seen anything about potions on the syllabus, have you?”

“They’re too easy to give to other people.” Cosette lifted a shoulder in a rueful shrug, putting the tea down on the table between them. “Could you sense what I was doing?”

“Yes,” Enjolras said, at the same time as Courfeyrac said, “I think so.” They looked at each other in surprise, then Courfeyrac grinned. “I guess you’ve always been more naturally sensitive.”

Enjolras nodded, not entirely pleased. He didn’t like the idea of being better at anything than Courfeyrac. Cosette looked down at her hands in her lap. “Well, you’re both practitioners, so that’s not exactly surprising. But it would be easy to slip a potion or an enchanted cake or something to someone who doesn’t know how to sense magic, and then you’re in a world of trouble.”

“Do you mostly enchant your own food and drink then?” Courfeyrac asked.

“And my papa’s, sometimes. But he always knows about it – it would be something like this tea, to help him feel awake in the morning, or sleep easier at night. I always do the same spell on his birthday cake,” she added, smiling at her lap. “I’m improving it each year. It’s to sort of convey the same feeling a hug gives you. I would never give someone spelled food without their permission though, of course. But it would be really easy, so I suppose that’s why they don’t want to teach us how to do it, just in case.”

“And because they want to teach us as little as they can get away with,” Enjolras said darkly. He frowned when Cosette raised her eyebrows. “You don’t think so? We’ve hardly done anything so far.”

“But that’s because most people will be beginners,” Cosette said, blinking big brown eyes at him. It made him feel inexplicably guilty. “They need to know some theory before trying the practical side of it.”

“ _Do_ they though?” Courfeyrac asked, looking between them. “We didn’t, when we were kids. As soon as you learn how to sense magic, you just sort of go. Didn’t you?”

Cosette shrugged a shoulder, looking almost nervous. “I’m not sure. I didn’t start playing with magic until I was about fourteen. It sounds like you started younger?”

“Oh yeah.” Courfeyrac grinned at Enjolras, who nodded.

“We both started really young. My mum taught me how to sense energy – she calls it energy – before I even started school, and I taught Courfeyrac. We used to just mess about with it, and like he said, we never knew any of the theory behind it.”

“But knowing the theory makes it more effective,” Cosette said softly. “That’s why spells from children are so easy to brush off, I thought. If you know the meaning and reason behind every part of your spell, it makes it much stronger. That’s always been the case for me.”

“Yeah.” Courfeyrac grabbed Enjolras’ notebook and flicked through it. “That is true, actually. And there are other parts to it as well – like home-crafted being stronger than store-bought.”

“Well that’s like anything,” Cosette smiled. “Like baking or cooking.”

Enjolras shrugged. “I’d never bother with making my own croissants though.”

“He tried it once,” Courfeyrac told Cosette, both of them grinning now. “Never again. It was pretty disgusting.”

“Thanks,” Enjolras deadpanned, smiling slightly to show Cosette he wasn’t serious. “The point is, with some things, it’s easier to get store-bought.”

“Sure, but it’ll be stronger if you do it yourself,” Courfeyrac argued, and Enjolras pointed at him.

“But you can only do that if you know _how_ to do it yourself, and that’s not information that’s freely available. We’re not being taught how to make glamours and…I don’t know, cast protection spells.”

“I think we will be though,” Cosette said. “Maybe not glamours, but we’ll definitely be taught how to cast spells for things like protection.”

“Great, more information we already know.” Enjolras rolled his eyes.

“But not everyone will know it,” Cosette countered. “You need to give everyone a chance. Not everyone was taught how to sense magic before they went to school. If you want to learn more advanced material, why not go and look for it?”

“You can’t get advanced magic books out while you’re in your first year,” Enjolras grumbled.

“So use someone else’s ID,” Cosette said, like it was simple.

“Too risky.” Enjolras scowled. “What would be better is a _fake_ ID so we could buy books beyond our level.”

“Expensive,” Courfeyrac pointed out. “And risky if our rooms are searched.”

“Less risky than stealing or borrowing someone else’s ID though.”

“I think the tea’s ready now,” Cosette announced, with the air of someone trying to get them back on track. She picked up the mug and took a sip, smiling after she’d swallowed. “It’s ready.” She passed it to Courfeyrac, who took a sip before passing it to Enjolras. It had the air of a ritual already, and Enjolras was smiling even before he lifted the mug to his lips.

It was hot, and like most tea, pretty flavourless, but as it went down his throat Enjolras felt like the lights inside his brain were being turned on.

“Holy shit, I want this every morning,” Courfeyrac said, gesturing for Enjolras to pass it back. “That’s so much faster than coffee! Wow, can you imagine how much stronger it would be with coffee?”

“It makes me a bit manic if I do it with coffee,” Cosette smiled. “I find it’s a slower release if I use tea. It’s good though, right?”

“It’s brilliant.” Enjolras smacked his lips and beamed at her. “How long does it last?”

“A couple of hours. Enough to get you through the horrible part of the morning, especially if you’re waking up early. My mother says you shouldn’t use it every day though – it’s easy to get hooked, and then if you miss a day, you feel ten times worse than you normally would. I’m a morning person anyway, so I don’t usually need it, but it’s good if you want to snap yourself awake for a boring class.”

“Did you make up the incantation yourself?” Courfeyrac asked, passing the tea to Cosette after taking a gulp (and probably burning his tongue, judging by his wince).

“Yes.” She smiled, shyer this time. “You can tell, right? It’s very simple. I tried to make it sound like a nursery rhyme, so it would be easy to remember.”

“It reminded me of _star light star bright,_ ” Courfeyrac agreed. “It’s great! It works really well. I always feel like an idiot saying stuff out loud.”

“Probably thanks to the influence of TV,” Enjolras muttered. Popular media was full of characters who were the butt of the joke because of their ineffective incantations. He took the mug from Cosette when she held it out and took another sip. It really was great – he didn’t feel sluggish from his late start at all anymore. They passed it around until it was all gone, and they were all grinning at each other.

“We should start rituals like that,” Courfeyrac said decisively. “With sharing a charmed drink or something.”

“I think covens do,” Cosette said, raising her eyebrows when they looked at her. “Is that wrong?”

“Who knows?” Enjolras shrugged. “Everything anyone knows about actual covens is hearsay. Do you mean the Orders though? Or illegal covens?”

“Both, I suppose.” Cosette chewed her lip, guileless. “I mean, the Orders are covens, aren’t they? A group of practitioners casting spells together? That’s a coven, no matter what you want to call it.”

“It’s legal if it’s an Order.” Courfeyrac frowned. “And no one knows anything about them, or even if there are any, really. No one will confirm or deny anything.”

“A bunch of elite groups of magical practitioners running the country behind everyone’s backs?” Enjolras sneered. “Sounds right to me.”

Cosette seemed to brace herself. “Sounds far-fetched to me.”

“You think so?”

“Enjolras,” Courfeyrac warned.

“They teach magic at all the grandes écoles,” Enjolras went on, ignoring him. “Why do that if they’re not inducting people into their own ways?”

“Who’s ‘they’?” Cosette asked, her voice still gentle in stark contrast to Enjolras’.

“The elite!” Enjolras waved an impatient hand, sitting up straight. “The establishment!”

“And who is that?” Cosette’s hands were twisted in her lap, but she met his eyes directly. “Is that the government? Or the owners of big businesses? Or the people who run the grandes écoles? Public sector or private? Or is it the police?”

“All of them!”

“That’s too many.” Cosette shook her head. “You’d never be able to get cooperation from that many people. You already don’t – these different factions are fighting each other all the time, aren’t they? They all have different goals. I’m not saying there aren’t Orders and covens within them,” she added before Enjolras could speak. “But sweeping generalisations make it sound like you really are a conspiracy theorist, and it makes you sound like a crank.”

“A what?” Courfeyrac seized the word, eyes laughing. Enjolras groaned.

“Come on.”

“A crank?” Cosette repeated, uncertain. Courfeyrac burst out laughing and pointed at Enjolras.

“That’s so you! A cranky crank!”

“Stop that.” Enjolras tried to sound serious, but it just came out sulky.

“Yeah, I’ll stop when you stop seeing the influence of the Orders behind stuff like the bakery running out of your favourite bread.”

“Shut up!” Enjolras pulled the cushion out from under himself and threw it at Courfeyrac, who caught it with another laugh. Enjolras was finding it hard to hold back a grin of his own now – it was impossible not to laugh when Courfeyrac did; the sound was too infectious. Cosette was giggling too. “You know what I mean!” he tried to go back to the topic. “So much stuff is too convenient not to be orchestrated at least a bit.”

“Like what?” Cosette smiled.

“Like the way magic is portrayed in pop culture,” Enjolras said, and waved at Courfeyrac to continue.

“It’s either a joke or a huge threat,” Courfeyrac said obligingly. “Or if it’s a show with sciencey elements like a medical drama or a sci-fi show, it’s an unpredictable irritation, or it doesn’t exist at all. For example, it’s a joke when a character does something like buy a love spell and it either doesn’t work or works in completely the wrong way. It’s a huge threat when it’s crime shows and you get practitioners doing shit like necromancy or something, and they’ve boosted themselves up to unrealistic power levels and they try to kill the good guys.”

“And so you have these fictional accounts made to look realistic telling people that magic is either a waste of time or too dangerous to attempt,” Enjolras said. “Couple that with no real magical education in schools until university, and the competitive nature of those courses, and you have the general population treating practitioners with suspicion.”

“Which is hypocritical,” Courfeyrac picked up. “Considering how many people are practitioners, even if they don’t think of themselves that way. Almost everyone in the country has gone to someone who sells magical services, usually a vaticinator or a diabolist. Incidentally, did you know that used to mean someone who consorted with devils?”

“Of course.” Cosette blinked. “Everyone who went to a Catholic school knows that. Don’t forget priests, by the way. If someone doesn’t like the association with demons that a diabolist has, they might go to a priest instead to talk about life after death. I don’t know whether anyone would consider that consulting a practitioner though.”

“The point is,” Enjolras cut in before they could get too side-tracked. “Most people now have a double-standard in their head where they regard people with an obvious interest in magic with suspicion and scepticism, while also occasionally practicing themselves, even if what they do is very small. If magic is something people use to guard against the inherent cruelty of life, almost everyone is a practitioner. The goalposts of the law could be moved at any time – we could all be criminals at the stroke of a pen.”

“Melodramatic, but true,” Courfeyrac nodded, and smiled at Cosette while Enjolras made a face at him. “Did you want lunch, by the way? We’ll have to go out, because I forgot that we don’t actually have any food, but I’m getting hungry.”

She smiled back. She hardly stopped smiling, now Enjolras thought of it. “Lunch would be nice.”

“Breakfast for you, I suppose,” Courfeyrac grinned at Enjolras and got up off the sofa. “You coming?”

“Sure.” Enjolras held out a hand and Courfeyrac helped him up. “We can talk about normal things in front of the public.”

“Normal,” Courfeyrac scoffed. “You don’t know the meaning of the word.” He kept chattering as they left, guiding the subject from magic to ‘normal things’. Enjolras didn’t want to give credence to Courfeyrac’s teasing, but he listened much more than he spoke when the topic wasn’t magic. It was nice to hear Courfeyrac and Cosette talk though, about things like TV shows and movies and music, and they did talk a little about their classes.

When Cosette left, she promised to bring her friend next time they met up. “His name’s Bahorel,” she told them, smiling brightly. “I know you’ll love him.”

**Author's Note:**

> Listen, I know it's been over four years since the last fic I posted in this series, but I swear it's been on my mind the whole time, and hopefully more will follow!


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